The family left behind

May 9, 2007

Updated: Monday, June 7, 2010 (10:51)

BECAUSE Leonie Evans spoke to her father every day, Leonard Clark, 75, has found it hard to accept that she will not ring him any more. Two weeks ago, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. His wife, Leonie s mother, died in 1988. Frazer Clark said his siste

BECAUSE Leonie Evans spoke to her father every day, Leonard Clark, 75, has found it hard to accept that she will not ring him any more. Two weeks ago, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. His wife, Leonie's mother, died in 1988.

Frazer Clark said his sister had been full of life. "She was a really good looking girl, there were always men chasing her. She had one hell of a sense of humour and she could talk you to death. She liked to go out and enjoy herself. She had tremendous energy for life. She was good at telling jokes. She was quite a clever person."

Even after Evans started beating her, she always put on a brave face, her brother said. "She still had her sense of humour but her body was very shakey. She suffered from seizures, which is not surprising because she was being hit about the head, her arms would be flailing."

Mr Clark, 45, an IT consultant, who lives in Milton Keynes, said words could not express how he felt about losing his sister. "You go about the daily hum drum of everything but when you stop and think that you will never speak to her again, that's when it hurts. You remember what you had and you regret what you didn't have, the time that you didn't spend with that person. She is sorely missed by everyone, every day."

He added: "Evans can never be forgiven for what he did, but his guilty plea took gumption. That is not to condone what he did, no one has the right to do to anyone what he did to Leonie. You don't do that. If things get too much you walk away.

"It has affected his family, too. They are suffering and they have got to live with what happened. The guilty plea and whatever sentence he gets doesn't change what happened. It doesn't take away what Leonie suffered. We only hope that because she had such a violent blow to her head that she didn't feel the pain of her final beating - but then she had been feeling the pain of beatings for years."

Mr Clark said his father had often begged Leonie to leave her husband but she would not. She was afraid of being alone.

"At one point, she was going to press charges against him but then she changed her mind. He would bring her presents and make her happy. People offer sweeteners afterwards and say it won't happen again. At Leonie's funeral I spoke to a woman who had been in the situation. She had left eventually but it had taken 30 years. Maybe Leonie wouldn't leave because of her three cats - you can't take pets into a hostel, we will never know.